A booking picture of Mr. Stancl is shown here. Mr. Stancl stands accused of luring 31 male classmates into sending him sexual images and video. He is also accused of blackmailing many of these classmates to try to get them to have sex with him. He suceeded in blackmailing 7 male classmates, according to victim testimony.

Male Facebook user posed as a girl and then lured classmates into sending him nude pictures, then blackmailed them for sex

An 18-year-old male student who resides near Milwaukee, WI is accused of perhaps the most bizarre and disturbing instances of social network sexual predation to date. The male, who attends New Berlin Eisenhower High School in New Berlin, which is about 15 miles west of Milwaukee, is accused of using Facebook to lure 31 of his male classmates into providing him with sexually explicit materials, and then blackmailing many of them into having sex with him.

Anthony Stancl was charged Wednesday on five counts of child enticement, two counts of second-degree sexual assault of a child, two counts of third-degree sexual assault, possession of child pornography, repeated sexual assault of the same child, and making a bomb threat.

According to officials, Mr. Stancl posed as a girl named Kayla or Emily on Facebook. He then lured his classmates, most of whom were underage, into sending nude video and photos to him. He was able to then tempt over 31 of his classmates into sending such pornographic materials.

After they sent the files, over half of the male classmates admitted that Mr. Stancl's alter-ego blackmailed them, threatening to release the embarrassing photos or videos if (her) demands were not met. The user threatened to send the photos to the male classmates' friends and post them all over the internet.

Mr. Stancl's alter-ego demanded that the boys meet with (her) "male friend" and exchange sex acts with him. The friend, of course, was Mr. Stancl. According to testimony, seven of the victims admit to performing sex acts on Mr. Stancl or having sex acts performed on them by Mr. Stancl. According to the boys, Mr. Stancl took pictures on his cell phone while engaging in these acts.

When raiding his house, police discovered 300 nude images of juvenile males on his computer. The youngest victim of sex acts was 15; the pictures included victims as young as 13-years-old.

The incidents, which started in spring 2007, finally ended in November of last year. Mr. Stancl was brought in for questioning about a bomb threat written on bathroom walls, which he stands accused of scrawling. The threat closed New Berlin Eisenhower Middle and High School. After his questioning, the victims began to come forward about their disturbing experience with Mr. Stancl and his alter-ego on Facebook.

Stancl's attorney, Craig Kuhary says his client will plead not guilty, but hopes to reach a plea agreement on the charges. He states merely, "It's too early in the case for me to make a statement, other than the fact at some point we are going to go into events that had taken place earlier that might have had some impact on what he did here."

New Berlin Police Lt. Mike Glider believes there may be even more victims. He is urging anyone Mr. Stancl contacted to come forward.

Mr. Stancl's preliminary hearing has been scheduled for February 26. If convicted of all the charges, he could receive a maximum sentence of 300 years behind bars.

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Let me propose a little thought experiment for DailyTech. I suggest several different scenarios, all with similarities to the case listed in this story, but with changes made specific in each.

Scenario #1: An 18 year old senior of her high school, who is admittedly quite attractive, asks guys in her school of pictures of them nude. She them sleeps with them. This includes some boys as young as thirteen, which would be considered soliciting sex from a minor.

Scenario #2: An 18 year old senior of her high school, who is rather homely and perhaps unable to get herself the attention she feels she deserves, poses as a much more attractive female online. Upon receiving requested nude photos of the male students she contacted, she then threatens to blackmail them to school and parents alike as deviants who sent unsolicited nude photographs of themselves to her for their jollies. This has serious legal consequences, she reminds them. In exchange for quiet, they sleep with her.

Scenario #3: An 18 year old senior of her high school, who is rather homely and perhaps unable to get herself the attention she feels she deserves, poses as an attractive male online. Upon receiving requested nude photos of the female students she contacted, she then threatens to blackmail them to school and parents alike as deviants who sent unsolicited nude photographs of themselves to her for their jollies. This has serious legal consequences, she reminds them. In exchange for quiet, they sleep with her.

Scenario #4: An 18 year old senior of his high school talks to other male students on IM. He is able to coerce some of them into sending nude photographs and then convinces them to explore their sexuality with him. All events have the consent of both parties.

Now a little analysis:

Now, we know the public’s reaction to scenario #1; I’ve affectionately termed it the “Debra Lafave phenomenon.” In other words, it’s considered natural and publically acceptable for an underage male to sleep with an attractive female, no matter the difference of age. I believe South Park made light of this fact.

I posit that scenario #2 would elicit a harsher reaction from the public and media than scenario #3 from similar reasoning: If you’re going to exploit someone for sex, making it between two females is a sure-fire way to majority (i.e., male) acceptance of the situation.

Yet scenario #4, despite its similarity to scenario #1, would be evaluated as worse than even scenario #2. Homosexuality is “unnatural” and something “kids shouldn’t get caught up in.” Never mind the fact that all of the persons in the age range described here are developing and exploring their sexuality. They're damn well going to get "caught up" in something, or I should say, someone. Homosexuality is seen like an unfortunate handicap by even open-minded people; you’re not a worse person, you just aren’t “like us” if you are. Or, as already some of the trolls have demonstrated, you think them a perverse scourge for being so.

tl;dr – This is shocking and offensive to the DailyTech commentariat not because that he used Facebook to blackmail students into sexual activities, but because he coerced them into homosexual activities.

I think you're being overly derrogatory to the posting community here, and overly sensitive to gay rights. While some are bigots here, most are not. The reaction to this is rightly incredulity that this person blackmailed classmates of his peer group and age into sleeping with him. This is not a decent way to behave and this needs to be communicated to him through whatever sentence is handed down.

Homosexuality is completely natural as has now been proven (duh) beyond most reasonable doubt based on the shape of the brain. Whilst you say that most open minded people consider it as a handicap, this has never been my experience in the UK, though Perhaps in America this is different. Where there are comments above which seem written by homophobes, its fairly obvious by their tone and phraseology. Decent, fair-minded people do pick up on this fairly quickly, it has to be said.

The adverse reaction to this sort of thing in the media and amongst straight people is actually shared by gay people who feel exasperated that somebody like this sets the cause of mainstream gay-acceptance back several years. At the end of the day, whilst there are many millions of gay people around the world, we are a minority to straight people so crimes involving a gay felon will be more unusual. The saddest thing is the orange is not his colour...

No, I don't believe that "Homosexuality is completely natural as has now been proven (duh) beyond most reasonable doubt based on the shape of the brain."No real scientific proof has been made in this area. But enough VIP and people of influence have been vocal to make most people at least ignore these claims.

Another thing is that no religion in the world accepts homosexuality as any kind of normal behaviour, and by it's own explanation, evolution means in any species the survival of the fittest and the passing of it's strong genes to offsprings, making any kind of homosexual behaviour dead with each generation. So homosexuality is not natural, it's a deviance to the normal. Yes they are still people, they can be better or worse than anyone around them because they are people, not because they are gay.

In this case just as crimes made against something specific to minorities receive harsher judgement from the society, so should crimes made because of something specific to the minority.

You might not believe it, but that comes down to your individual faith. I have no religious beliefs whatsoever and neither do millions or billions of other people, and the religious viewpoint doesn't really affect scientific outcomes, does it?. Religion at least is something you choose to believe in and is not genetically determined.

The fact that no religion in the world deigns to "accept" a naturally occuring phenomenon which also exists in the animal world is also irrelevent. I really couldn't care less what they choose to believe, and frankly how many burning bushes and people-turning-into-salt do you see on a daily basis? Since when did we base modern scientific understanding on the Bible, of all things? Evolution also brought about homosexuality (by your own argument, and they are 'generally' born to heterosexual parents lol) and there's nothing to stop gay people from using their own DNA to reproduce, just not with each other...they even have been known not to have gay children. Wow, how shocking! </sarcasm> Its almost as shocking as you declaring first that religion is against homosexual acts and then using *Evolution* of all theories to try and cement your point. I think the two do not make good bed-fellows...

Gay people don't need VIP's and people of influence to tell the wider world that it is naturally occurring, because they already know this for themselves. Perhaps if you actually talk to any, before gracing us with your opinion, it would be as obvious to you.

You might as well say that Black people, Jews and other minorities are 'deviants' because from a gay person's perspective this argument is absolutely no different (the Nazis certainly treated all these groups similarly). I'm sure that religious people would love homosexuality not to be naturally occurring so that they can carry on their hate campaign against it, blaming them for hurricanes, floods and other kinds of generally inclement weather. Ludicrous.

Those with a functioning brain (gay or straight) can make their own minds up on which is believable and facts-based and which claim is made up by narrow minded, frequently hypocritical, people to pray upon the divisiveness and gullability of the their target audience.

Where in my post did you see anything about the bible or burning bushes or people-turning-to-salt???

"A UK scientist said this was evidence sexual orientation was set in the womb." This does not make for scientific proof. It's someone opinion on the matter. Of course you'll take for granted and point others to someone who supports your view point. Just as I normally do. No human on earth will be objective to this and a few other clashing view points. Until there is flowing research from the womb to gay bar, there is no proof.

Just because religion and evolution don't stand together it doesn't make the point invalid. As you said, humans can adopt or use DNA to continue life. What other species on earth can do that? The general rule of evolution as stated before in this case stands. Why we need a liquid hidrogen tube to support a 'naturally occurring' thing?

By the way Hollywood and western media go about it you'd think half the world is homosexually oriented. Yet out of 6.5 billion people, only millions are as. So I say that VIP and people in position do influence the general view on this point.

Well done! Try to mix in race, ethnicity and the evil in the world in, so I would be afraid to speak out against a behaviour? That will surely make me more narrow minded.

Just because something like gay behaviour happens in millions of people on the planet doesn't mean it's naturally occurring. Rape is a behaviour that happens much more frequent, yet we can't accept it as natural, it's a criminal behaviour. Handicaps or other birth defects or sickness is not accepted as natural no matter how often it happens. Now because homosexuality is not a criminal behaviour or something interfering with normal life and activities doesn't make it any more natural.

No religion? The Iriquois certainly accepted them. Gay braves were usually elite warriors.

The Anglican Church appears to accept homosexuality. At least they are willing to ordain gay ministers.

Just two examples. There are many religions around the world which are quite accepting of gays. The USA is quite backward and provincial in this respect.

You personally do not like gays and they are unacceptable in your religion. Your religion is not the only one in this world.

As for evolution, look at African wild dogs and around the world the various wolves. The alpha female raises pups, the rest of the pack supports them. To be a junior pack member is similar to being a strict gay ... no offspring. Canines are not alone in this type of behavior.

The Theory of Natural Selection does not state that seeming non-survival characteristics will die out. It simply states that unless there is an offsetting advantage, the characteristic will be less likely to be passed on. Having double sickle cell anemia genes is usually fatal, a single offers resistance to malaria, none makes malaria more dangerous ... sickle cell anemia disappears from the population when malaria is removed ... it becomes more common where malaria exists.

When there is a chance that a small neo-natal change wil generate homosexuality it will be selected against...if the same thing also provides a benefit then you will see the non-survival trait in a constant percentage of the population generation after generation.

Homosexuality appears to be a non-survival characteristic, but there is evidence that homosexuality has been around for as long as we have written records. I'd say that it is unlikely to be cultural since it appears in all cultures and religions. That last part strongly implies a biological basis. There are also brain changes that have been found to be consistent with the individual's sexual preferences.

#1 She is 18 and her partners are underage -- Statutory rape. In Washington she is okay as long as the age diff is 4yrs or less. Your 13yr old would still send her to jail in Washington

#2 Blackmail and possible rape/molestation charges based on coerced sexual relations. In addition see #1 which applies to this also

#3 Blackmail and possible rape/molestation charges based on coerced sexual relations. In addition see #1 which still applies here. The rape/molestation charges are more likely to result in conviction than #2

#4 If they are underage then #1 again applies. Blackmail and molestation charges are possible once the police start interviewing the "willing" partners.

Your analysis to number one does not stop the County Prosecutor from campaigning for votes by prosecuting a statutory rapist.

#2 & #3 remain blackmail cases and regardless of the mix of people will remain blackmail cases. The mix and details will determine whether rape is added.

#4 is the least likely to generate charges since there appears to be no coercion. The first impression will be that it is no worse than any other 2 students getting into bed due to mutual desire. If some of those partners provide evidence of blackmail then again a prosecutor looking to polish an image may take it to court.

The predator in the article is your Scenario #3 with a gay male as the perp. The items charged are blackmail, coerced sex (rape) and depending on the laws in his state possible statutory rape. The added charges of creating and possessing child pornography simply make it much more likely that he will spend life behind bars where he will learn that a profile on a dating site and honest answers on what you want is a much safer way to get into BDSM.